Synopsis: Tenshinhan says he's been saving a special move to finish Goku off with, and while Chaozu wonders if it's 'that' move, Tsuru-sennin chuckles and says Goku's finished. Roshi and Kuririn watch with dismay as they wonder what Tenshinhan has planned. Tenshinhan promptly tosses Goku into the air, and announces that it's time for the 'Volleyball play'. After his face momentarily takes on an out-of-character goofy look, Tenshinhan rushes forward, hitting Goku just before he could touch the ground, followed by striking him further into the air with both his palms once Goku started to fall back a second time. Tenshinhan finishes by leaping into the air, passing Goku, and then spiking the boy back into the floor of the ring like a volleyball.
Tenshinhan lands and smirks as Tsuru-sennin thinks Goku must surely be dead, but much to everyone's surprise, Goku hops right back onto his feet. Goku says he's impressed by how strong Tenshinhan really is, and Tenshinhan likewise praises Goku's resilience. Goku says he thinks Tenshinhan wouldn't die even if Goku hit him at full power, and says he thinks he'll start going all out after all. Tenshinhan scoffs and says Goku's already been going all out, but Goku says that's only been at his 'tournament' level of power – now he's going to be coming at Tenshinhan at his 'battle' level. As Kuririn and Roshi try to figure out what Goku means, Tenshinhan accuses Goku of playing around and tells him to strike when he's ready. Goku takes Tenshinhan up on this, rushing in faster than Tenshinhan can react and punching him square in the face before following up with a ferocious series of punches and finally a kick that sends Tenshinhan flying backwards. Goku isn't done yet however, and quickly leaps after Tenshinhan, diving into the area between his opponent's body and the ring and kicking Tenshinhan up into the sky. Goku readies a Kamehameha to fire at his opponent's unguarded back...but stops, deciding against it. As Tenshinhan lands back in the ring, winded now, Goku chuckles and says he must have really felt that one. Tenshinhan laughs as well and says that he's happy to find out that there's someone out there like Goku who can truly challenge him and says that winning against someone like Goku will make his victory all the more sweet. Kuririn says that Goku was foolish to stop without firing his Kamehameha, but Roshi says it's the opposite – Goku's looking ahead, and saw that the Kamehameha would be easily dodged by Tenshinhan and ultimately just waste energy that he'd need to keep fighting, as this match is sure to be a long one. Both fighters then clash once more with renewed vigor. Review: This chapter is more excellent fighting that I cannot recommend highly enough that people check out for themselves, but it does give us a few new elements worth talking about as well in-between and sometimes even through the fighting itself. Let's start by talking about the Volleyball play. I love the Volleyball play. It's so ridiculously stupid that it almost comes off as cool, and is made even more so by the fact that it's being done by someone as grim serious as Tenshinhan, especially the Tenshinhan we've had up to this point. The face he makes is just pure comedy gold, and it's surprising that he's seemingly not embarrassed by it in any way given how stoic he usually is. The fact that it's meant to be a fight-ending maneuver as well is pretty entertaining – maybe the idea is that usually nobody that sees the face lives to tell of it. That sounds like a thing assassin's would do or say, right? The move of course does fail to kill Goku, but it does succeed in drawing Goku out of his 'tournament mode', revealing that he'd been operating at less than full capacity this entire time. On the one hand, this almost seems kind of dirty of Goku after he promised Kuririn that he would go all out only for it to turn out that Goku was holding back this entire time. At the same time however, this new level of 'power' Goku brings out doesn't seem to greatly change his tactics or maneuvers, just how hard he's hitting. While that's definitely holding back in one way, it's kind of hard to say if he was truly being deceptive about it or not given how his reasoning for bringing it out now is worded. Goku refers to this full strength as 'battle mode', and he only brings it out because he can tell Tenshinhan is hitting to kill and likewise durable enough not to be killed that easily himself. Hitting someone with the intent to knock them out versus hitting them with the intent to kill are two radically different things, and not doing the latter isn't necessarily the same thing as holding back in a sense, so...honestly, this is a little bit debatable I'd say. At least, going off of just this match alone, anyway. A far later story point will directly show Goku holding back rather than going all out, and that doesn't even have the excuse of being a tournament match where he has to worry about disqualification, so it's definitely something in Goku's character as well, so...take what you will away from this dialogue. Whether he was holding back before in terms of pure power or not aside, Goku does specifically hold back once in this chapter by choosing not to fire a Kamehameha at Tenshinhan, and this time it's definitely a calm and calculated maneuver. Just as Kuririn has been showing he's grown to be a fighter that can think as well as punch, Goku likewise is finally getting to show how much he's matured since the last time we saw him, and it's great to see. Goku might not be intelligent in the traditional sense, but there's no denying that few are as smart as him when it comes to thinking on the fly in the middle of a fight. Two chapters in and this fight is still just barely getting going, but it's already just as entertaining if not more so than any fight we've yet had in the series – definitely a sign that what's to come is going to be even better yet. Until next time! Favorite Panel:
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September 2022
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